Page 40 of Acadia Falls

“Har de har har,” Tommy grumbled as he started preparing the traps.

“What’s with you?” Ralph asked me. “You’ve never gone out this late before. Your father never did, either.”

I shrugged. “Guess I overslept.”

The old fisherman raised his eyebrows. “Doesn’t seem like you, kid.”

I sighed. “I’m sure my dad was late once in his life. Maybe when one of us was born?”

“Nope.” Ralph shook his head. “Sean Brennan never missed a run. Never had a sick day, either, not so far as I’m aware of.”

I pictured my mother alone in the hospital, giving birth to me and my brothers. I wondered if my father’s insane work ethic bothered her then. Probably not. My mother was as loyal to my father as could be. She took pride in how hard he worked to provide for his family. I’d never once heard her utter a word against him.

“Is this about what’s going on with the manganese?” Ralph raised his eyebrows. “You thinking about cashing out?”

I sighed. That was the thing with the island: everybody knew everything. “No, Ralph, we’re not.”

“I heard Trey and Cuddy’ve been giving you a hard time.” He scratched his ear.

“I’m hoping they’ve learned their lesson. But then again, they’re both as dumb as a box of rocks.”

Ralph shook his head. “Not sure what’s going on around here. Never seen a Brennan that’s overslept, and now we’ve got outsiders from Mass-hole-chusetts up here cutting lines. The world’s going to hell, I guess.”

“It might be,” I agreed.

“You remember what your father said, boy.”

“What’s that?”

He narrowed his eyes at me. “That being all-fish is the only way to be.”

All-fish was the term we used to describe fishermen who cared about fishing above everything else, including their children’s birth. It represented a specific breed of fishermen, myself included, who went out on the water every day, year-round. We rarely talked about anything besides the tide, our traps, the price of lobster per pound, and the upcoming weather.

I sighed as I headed down the dock. “I know it is.”

“Don’t let anybody tell you there’s something better out there ’cause there’s not,” Ralph called. “Not even a pretty blonde from New York!”

“Gee, Ralph, tell me how you really feel,” I mumbled as I hopped on the boat, grateful that Tommy immediately pulled out into the harbor.

All-fish is the only way to be.

As if I didn’t already know that.

“What’s he yammering about?” Tommy asked over the roar of the motor.

“Nothing important.” But I wondered, as we headed out late—the latest we’d ever left for our route—if maybe old Ralph didn’t have a point.

“I haven’t asked you about it because you’ve been busy every night,” Tommy said, keeping his voice neutral, “but I was wondering what you wanted to do. About Everly Reyes.”

We’d gotten back from our route after everyone else had already hauled in their traps and weighed in. Ralph grumbled at us for making him wait, but I ignored the old man. It wasn’t like he had anything better to do!

Before heading home to clean up, Tommy and I grabbed beers from the restaurant. We sat in the parking lot, drinking and watching the water.

“I don’t know what to do,” I admitted.

“A billion dollars is a lot of money.” Tommy looked thoughtful as he stared out at the waves. “Even if we split it between the four of us, it’s a lot.”

I blew out a deep breath. “I know.” The thing was, I didn’t know. What the hell would I do with two hundred and fifty million dollars? We already had several million sitting in the bank right now, courtesy of our manganese deals, and I didn’t know what to do with that. Ryan kept saying we needed to invest it, but I’d been too busy fishing to give it much thought.